Van Halen Unleash ‘Hang ‘Em High’ at Boston Concert

Van Halen performed ‘Hang ‘Em High’ live for the first time in years at their concert last night (March 11) in Boston, adding yet another deep album cut to their ever-expanding on-stage repertoire.

The charging number is one of the more traditional Van Halen riff-rockers on the otherwise covers-heavy and extremely sunny 1982 album ‘Diver Down,’ and the crowd went pretty much bughouse when they broke it out late in the show.

Although the set list remains largely the same as on the tour’s opening night, there were some changes — most notably the band’s use of ‘Unchained’ as the first song. On second viewing, it’s clear that this is an amazingly fast-paced show, with almost zero between song banter and very few chances for David Lee Roth or the audience to catch their breath.

Diamond Dave’s voice is stronger than you might think, he’s picking and choosing his spots wisely, and the father and son team of Eddie and Wolfgang Van Halen do a great job delivering the band’s heavenly pop-influenced choruses. Still, it does seem that a slow song earlier in the set, an extended guitar solo or two (and dare we say, perhaps the mighty pipes of a certain original bassist?) might help a little bit.

Regardless, now we’ve seen ‘Girl Gone Bad,’ ‘the Full Bug,’ ‘Hear About it Later’ (by the way – man oh man do we disagree with our weekend team’s assessment of that song) and ‘Outta Love Again’ added to Van Halen setlists in recent weeks. What is it going to take for our ‘Drop Dead Legs’ wish to come true?

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